Agatha Christie, The Pale Horse

Amy Lee (The Open University)
Download PDF Add to Bookshelf Report an Error

The Pale Horse is a converted Tudor Inn which enjoys sinister reputations: to the curious public, the middle-aged female proprietors are three witches who practice the black arts and communicate with agents of the other world; to those anxious to remove unwanted rich relatives, The Pale Horse and its mysterious attendants mean arranged natural death through unknown forces.

At the beginning of the narrative the famous historian Mark Easterbrook is eating at a Chelsea pub where two young girls, among a bunch of friends with very brightly coloured hair, are ragging each other over some boys. Through this scene of young people's unruly behaviour, Mark hears of The Pale Horse in a causal remark by a friend's friend. From then on, strange and seemingly unrelated incidents start to occur around

609 words

Citation: Lee, Amy. "The Pale Horse". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 October 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=7328, accessed 19 March 2024.]

7328 The Pale Horse 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

Save this article

If you need to create a new bookshelf to save this article in, please make sure that you are logged in, then go to your 'Account' here

Leave Feedback

The Literary Encyclopedia is a living community of scholars. We welcome comments which will help us improve.